We assume that Uncle Sam handsomely rewarded the single combat warriors who hung their asses far out over the line and did one of the most amazing things that any of us can imagine. But no. Not at all. When they went to the Moon, they received the same per diem compensation as they would have for being away from base in Bakersfield: eight dollars a day, before various deductions (like for accommodation, because the government was providing the bed in the spaceship).

Deductions! Because the spaceship was providing them accommodation! Godspeed and all, boys, but if you order room service up there, you pay out of pocket.

That works out to over $100,000 in 2012 dollars -- generous, but also, considering the astronauts' substantial education and the even more substantial risk they were taking in their mission, notably low. No hazard pay here. And that is, in part, fitting: Though the astronauts got the attention for Apollo 11, they were simply part of a team at NASA that made the moonwalk a success. In every interview they gave and every public move they made both before and after their journey, they made clear that, before anything else, they were pilots, pure and simple. Their salaries reflected that status.

But the numbers here are also telling in the context of NASA's insistent bureaucracy. This is what astronomic accounting looks like: a salary, with a per diem, with deductions. Which is a nice reminder that, as epic as it was as a piece of history, the three mens' journey to the moon was ultimately the product of the most mundane thing in the world: a government agency. And its costs were handled accordingly.